The most exciting wine I had.

We all had or chance to during some nice wine, some good wine and even some great wine. But did you ever had an exciting wine?
I remember my first real exciting wine, you know, the wine you did not expect to be all that great but turned out to be real special. The kind of wine you’ll love talk about among wine lovers.

Well, mine was a Turkish wine. Yes you heard me right, Turkish. I know Turkey is not considered an excellent wine producer, but this time they did something right.
I tasted this wine about 8 years ago and just about when I was starting to show interest in wines. I had no idea about wine rating or even how to taste wine. All I knew was that I like drinking it. So, I can’t give you my testing notes for this wine, rather I can tell you about the experience itself.

Kavaklidere – Selection Red 1987 (Grape: Öküzgözü, Boğazkere)

The year was 2002, and I was living in Turkey back then (Used to work for the ministry). We were having a nice dinner on a Friday night with friends from the embassy, and I remembered that I have in my wine cabinet an interesting wine that caught my eye the other day at the local wine store. I was intrigued by this wine since I could not find any vintage from before or after 1987. It seemed like they released a version of this wine back in 87 and the following year was 99, which is odd, since none takes a 12 years break in wine making. So I said what the hell, lets take one and try it.

Back to our diner, some 15 minutes before we set down to eat, I opened the bottle and poured it into a decenter. I was not much of an expert but I did know that a 15 years old wine should be given the chance to open up a bit before you approach it. However, being very curious about this wine I decided to take a sip right then and there to see what we are dealing with.
If you could see the look on my face, you would now be laughing you head off, as it was pour acid mixed with sulfur. Not giving up I decided not to tell anyone about this wine and come back and try it 15 minutes later.

When I came back after 15 minutes it was a whole different story, when wine was now drinkable and was even starting to show some interesting flavors. One thing I do remember is that the color was brownish.
I took the decenter and poured wine to all of our friends, and we decided to try it every 5 minutes. As time grow by, the wine evolved beautifully, each time showing us a new layer of flavors. At about 45 minutes after I opened the bottle the wine reached its peek and it was magnificent. unfortunately it only lasted for 10 more minutes, after which it was broken and undrinkable.

I will always remember this wine as my first exciting wine, and now I know why it was the only vintage to survive for 12 years.
Hope you enjoyed this story. If you have an exciting wine you want to share with me & my readers please drop a comment.

cheers